One dead, two injured in Melbourne knife rampage

One person was killed and two are in hospital after a man attacked police and members of the public with a knife in Melbourne.

Footage posted on social media showed the man lunging at police officers with a knife on a busy shopping street in Australia’s second-largest city.

Witnesses said he had earlier parked his vehicle on the street before throwing something into it which made it explode.

He then started to attack those around him before being shot in the chest by police.

He has been arrested and was taken to hospital under police guard, where he is described as being in a critical condition.

Superintendent David Clayton said investigators are “keeping an open mind” and there was “no known link to terrorism at this stage”.

Police had been called to a report of a car alight on Bourke Street at 4.20pm Friday, local time and as they got out of their car there were “confronted by a male brandishing a knife and threatening them”, Mr Clayton said.

“At the same time passers-by were calling out that members of the public had been stabbed,” he added.

Two people, apparently members of the public, came to the aid of police, one using a shopping trolley and another using a chair to try and stop the attacker.

Social media footage showed the attacker trying several times to stab one of the officers before a second officer drew his gun and a single shot could be heard.

Mr Clayton said: “Three people have been stabbed, unfortunately one is deceased at the scene.

“Two other victims are currently in hospital.”

The victims appeared to have been stabbed in the upper body, police said.

The Melbourne Age reported that one had a head injury and the other a neck injury.